Amira's History, Our Mentor in Belly Dance - Amira Dance Productions, Wichita KS

The History of Amira, our Mentor

Amira Dance Productions, belly dancing in Wichita Kansas

"We are more than simply proud of Amira. We are in awe!" - Terri Dirks, Student and Friend

Amira (Alice Castilow), started dancing when she was 8 years old. Alice studied ballet, tap, also piano and voice. Upon relocating to the Mid-West, Alice became involved with Wichita Civic Ballet. In 1970, June Landrith along with Alice and Iris Clark, incorporated the Metropolitan Ballet Company. With a deep love for ballet, she served as ballet mistress, choreographer, costumer, soloist, and Associate Artistic Director for the Met. However....

Early in 1974, Middle Eastern dance was sweeping the nation and it swept Alice into its throng. Alice traveled to the West Coast to study with an authentic teacher. The norm was to adopt an Arabic name, thus she selected an appropriate name "Amira" meaning princess. Amira received the bulk of her training in NYC from Ibrahim "Bobby" Farrah, international performer, choreographer, teacher, publisher and authority on Middle Eastern dance. This was a turning point in her career. Bobby's training demonstrated to Amira, "Danse Oriental" ranks as dance art and was worthy of her dedication and enthusiasm.

Amira has been our mentor for all of our current instructors. Her passing in May of 2004 was a tremendous loss to the dance community, however we have endeavored to carry on the shining light of her spirit through our dance and through our studio. She is the inspiration and motivation behind our approach to teaching and performing dance.